Study Finds Health IT Adoption Growing

A new study released by the Computing Technology Industry Association (CompTIA) shows that up to 50% of healthcare provides have either adopted electronic health records are are partially using them.

The study, which included 300 US healthcare providers, found that 34% are now using a "comprehensive" electronic health record system and 16% say they are using a "partial" system.

About 29% said they are evaluating their options, while another 20% indicated they have not yet looked at the issue.

Of those who have adopted EHRs, 59% said they were completely or mostly satisfied with their EHR and 36% indicated they were partly satisfied or partly dissatisfied.  The survey would seem to indicate dentists are the most satisfied  user of EHRs (70%) compared to medical doctors (57% satisfied).

OIG Work Plan for Fiscal Year 2011

A quick review of the Office of Inspector General's work plan indicates 2011 reviews will continue to focus on ensuring providers can justify the appropriateness of what they are doing, either from a clincial perspective or a documentation perspective.

 

Evaluation & Management (E&M) claims will be evaluated to ensure:

•  Documentation supports the level of service reported - specifically that there is not identical documenation used to record the patient encounter for each & every patient. 
• Coding patterns, by provider, accurately reflect the service provided.  Specifically, that billing for E&M services reflect the individual type, setting and complexity of services provided to each patient.    

For services performed in hospital outpatient departments or ambulatory surgical centers (ASC), the OIG will audit to determine whether physicains properly coded the place of service on claims.  To review the current list of location codes used for billing go to: https://www.cms.gov/MedHCPCSGenInfo/Downloads/Place_of_Service.pdf

 

 

 

Meaningful Use - What's Next?

The Health IT Policy Committee, a federal advisory group, has begun work on developing the meaningful use requirements for stages 2 and 3 of the federal Medicare and Medicaid healthcare IT adoption incentive program. 

Stage 1 incentives begin in January, 2011 and CMS and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology will begin monitoring data submitted to help fomulate some aspects of the stage 2 and 3 requirements.  Currently, interoperability appears to be a big focus of the stage 2 requirements, however a meaningful use workgroup is expected to present recommendations to the HIT policy committee today (October 20th), with opportunities for additional public input beginning in November. 

If all goes well, providers and vendors should have a good idea of what will be expcted in the Stage 2 and 3 incentives by mid-year 2011.